Hope you enjoy the chapter!!!!!
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Ο Διακυρίττεσθαι Άντεξελαύνω Νύξ
Leo
I swiped my hand threw the Iris message, and walked out of the lounge. The prophecy had given me a strange feeling in my stomach. What if this prophecy had to do with us? What if I lost one of my friends because of it? After all, it did say one would fall while the others stand. I mulled over this thought, while I walked up the stairs and on the deck of the ship.
I walked over to the railing and stared off at the horizon. If I was a part of this prophecy, then my search for Calypso would have to be postponed. No, I couldn’t do that to her; she has been stuck on that island for too long. Besides who said that the prophecy was going to take place anytime soon, for all we know it could take place a hundred years from now.
‘Enemies will bear arms and go up north.’ That line kept running through my head. Enemies, who were the enemies? It couldn’t be the Romans, we were getting along well with them now, and we don’t have any rival groups at the moment, well at least not that we know of. I thought and thought but couldn’t come up with anyone that would be considered enemies to us.
I dismissed the thought and moved on. Next line is what really scared me. ‘One will fall while the others stand.’ Obviously it didn’t mean someone was just going to fall down while the rest of us stood above him or her looking down at them considering if it was worth it to help them up or not. I personally like that idea better, but someone was going to die and I had a feeling it was going to be someone I knew not just some random guy off the street.
‘The child of Death will defeat night and sand?’ Did that mean Hazel or Nico will defeat something at night in a sandy place? No, that just sounded ridiculous. I don’t know what to think of this line. All I could think about was Calypso; I just couldn’t get her out of my head. I missed her so much. Yes, it sounds crazy to be so head over heels for her, but she was the first girl I actually liked besides Hazel. The other ones were just me being stupid.
All of a sudden, I got this feeling someone was watching me, but I decided against it. No one was watching me; I’m too pathetic for anyone to care about. I could hear some one walk up the stairs behind me then walk over to me. I just ignored them acted like I hadn’t heard them at all.
“Leo, you have to decide, are we continuing the search or are we returning to Camp Half-Blood?” the person said. I now realized that it was Hazel who had come to talk to me. I didn’t want to talk to her so continued to stare off and act like I didn’t hear her.
“Leo!” she shouted at me angrily. I couldn’t take it any longer people were always asking me what to do, but I never knew. They always decide, ‘Oh Leo’s life isn’t hard enough let’s give him more things to deal with.’
“I don’t know!” I snapped. “I want to go back and help at camp, it’s my only home. But I can’t leave her stranded on an island I can’t find, Hazel!”
Hazel looked at me sympathetically. “I know, but you need to decide before it’s too late. It could happen any day now. If we’re too late, we could go back and find nothing but ruins.” She turned around and started to go below decks.
“Hazel?” I asked her.
She stopped walking and turned around to face me. “Yes?”
I turned away from the railing and looked at Hazel. Look at what was happening to us, all of us. Hazel and I barely speak anymore, Frank treats me like I’m a piece of gum stuck to the bottom of his shoe, and I block everyone out. We were all growing a part and ignoring each other.
“The prophecy, do you think it involves us?” I asked.
Hazel looked at her feet and replied “I…” But before Hazel could finish, the sonar alarm went off. It had detected something coming at the ship and I didn’t have time to change the Argo II to flying mode. I pulled a giant hammer out of my tool belt, and Hazel unsheathed her gladius.
Just then Frank ran above deck and looked at us quizzically. Then there was a huge splash behind us and I turned around fast and what I found was the worlds ugliest giant octopus.
Its body was covered in barnacles, and it had what looked like boils all over its face. Its eight arms were everywhere and starting to wrap around the Argo II.
“My ship!” I yelled mortified as the octopus started to squeeze tighter causing the wood to crack. Coach ran out of the captain’s headquarters swinging his baseball bat around screaming “Die you stupid fish!” There is seriously something wrong with that goat.
One of the arms came through the air to my right and I quickly threw myself to the ground just as it grazed over me.
“Frank watch out!” Hazel screamed. Frank, who was busy fighting off one of the other arms, didn’t notice that the arm I had ducked was coming straight at him until it was too late. As he jumped out of the way he was hit by the leg and thrown down the stairs to the lower deck with a crash. I didn’t hear any movement coming from down there and I knew he was knocked out cold.
“Frank!” Hazel screamed worriedly. I swung around and dropped my hammer knowing it would be useless against the overgrown octopus.
“I’ve got this!” I yelled over all of the commotion. I lit my hands on fire and grinned as I sent fireballs hurtling towards the monster. After about 20 fireballs I knew I was just annoying it than anything else, so I put my hands out. I looked over at Hazel as she cut off one of its arms, and then went in to a run towards the creature. When she reached the edge of the boat, she jumped over the railing with her gladius raised above her head.
Her gladius sunk in to the heart of the beast and it screeched from the pain. I let out I relieved breath and grabbed my hammer off the ground and put it back in my tool belt. I then realized that Hazel hadn’t jumped back on to the ship. I ran over to the railing and looked down. Hazel was nowhere to be seen. I stepped away from the railing and took a running start before diving over the edge.
Let’s just say I’m not the best at diving. When I hit the water it was more like a belly flop than a dive. I tried not to think about the pain, and started searching Hazel. I was stupid and forgot we were in the ocean, so I opened my eyes and it burned. I quickly closed them and reached into my tool belt and pulled out some welding googles. Well it would have to do because I didn’t have much time.
I put them on and looked at my surroundings. All around me was empty water, but when I looked down I could see a figure slowly sinking. I swam as fast as I could towards it before it got to deep. I could feel the water pressure rising and I needed to go up for air, but I knew I wouldn’t have time to.
When I reached for Hazel, I quickly grabbed her arm and started swimming upwards. Black dots started to dance across my vision as my lungs burned. I knew we wouldn’t both make it up so I pushed Hazel upwards and hoped that she would float up to the surface where Frank could easily get to her.
My vision started to blur and I needed a breath of air so badly. I breathed in a mouth full of sea water and experienced what it was like to be drowning. The last thing I could think of was Calypso. ‘I hope someone helps her off that island.’ I thought. I hoped she wouldn’t hate me forever and know that I tried to return to her.
I stopped struggling and felt my mind going blank. ‘So this is how feels to die.’ I thought. And just before I blacked out something floated down towards me. It looked like a dolphin but I couldn’t be sure. Then everything went black.
When I woke up, I was in the sick bay of the ship. I looked to my left and saw Hazel lying in a bed next to me motionless, and Frank was sitting next to her holding her hand.
“How did I get here?” I asked completely confused trying to figure out how I had gotten on the ship.
“After I woke back up, I ran over to the side of the boat and saw Hazel floating at the surface of the water. So I changed into a giant eagle, flew down and grabbed her. When I got her back on the Argo II, I noticed you were nowhere to be seen. I dove over the edge of the boat and changed into a dolphin and found you unconscious under water.” Frank said all of this with a worried expression on his face.
His face was pale and he kept looking at Hazel and holding her hand. Hazel’s lips were blue and her face was a sickly pale color.
“Is she going to be all right?” I asked worried about losing one of the few friends I had.
“I don’t know, but you should probably go and fix the ship there are leaks everywhere.”
I got out of the bed slowly and stood up. I got light headed for a minute and had to use the bed to support me, but it soon passed.
I walked out of the sick bay and saw water on the floor. The walls were leaking in water and I had to improvise on how to fix them. I took small pieces of plywood out of my tool belt and nailed them on and went on with fixing the holes as fast as I could.
By the time I had fixed all of the holes in the ship, Hazel had woken up. When I entered the sick bay, she was sitting up talking to Frank.
“So what are you guys talking about?” I asked walking over to Hazel’s bed.
“It’s none of your business, Valdez.” Frank said glaring at me. I threw my hands up in mock surrender. Jeez you help save his girlfriend’s life and he still hates you.
After seeing the condition the ship was in, I knew we had no choice but to go back to camp. The Argo II was not going to last much longer so I went to walk out of the room.
“Where are you going?” Hazel asked as I reached the door way.
“I need to go change the ships course we have a summer camp to get to.” I said as I left the room. I ran down the halls until I reached the bridge. Coach Hedge was whistling happily as he steered the ship. I went to the Archimedes sphere and typed new coordinates into its GPS.
“What are you doing, Cupcake?” Coach said walking towards me with his hands on his hips.
“I will be steering the ship now; we have a new destination.” I stated walking up to the wheel.
“And where is that, Valdez?” he asked giving me a crazy look.
“Home.”